He turned and sat him down again to fight the fight with a chill suspicion in his heart of what the end would be.
Being a plain man he had only plain words in which to phrase his decision when at last he came to it.
“I chose her and I’ll bear the consequences of my choice,” he said, “but I’ll bear them by myself. His aunt will be glad to take Teddy, and Dora is old enough to go away to school.” Then he opened the door.
Hopson and his wife had left the little parlor. Julie on the sofa had fallen into the deep sleep of exhaustion. MacDonald still sat there, with his head in his hands, and to him Applegate turned. At the sound of his step the man lifted his massive head and shook it impatiently.
“Well?” he demanded.
“The fact is, Mr. MacDonald, Julie and I don’t get along very well together, but I don’t know as that is any reason why I should force her to do anything that don’t seem right to her. She thinks it would be more”—he hesitated for a word—“more nearly right to get a divorce from you and remarry me. As I see it now, it’s for her to say what she wants, and for you and me to do it.”
MacDonald looked at him piercingly.
“You know you’d be glad of the chance to get rid of her!” he exclaimed, excitedly. “In Heaven’s name, then, why don’t you make her come to me? You know I suit her best. You know she’s my sort, not yours. She’s as uncomfortable with you as you with her, and she’d soon get over the feeling she has against me. Man! There’s no use in it! Why can’t you give my own to me?”
“I can’t say I don’t agree with you,” said Applegate, and the words seem to ooze painfully from his white lips, “but she thinks she’d rather not, and—it’s for her to say.”